And straight on till morning
by T. Alana M
Summary: From time to time, Peter Pan visits the Enchanted Forest. It is unfortunate that he does so when the first curse hits. Life as a Storybrooke resident, he finds, is not quite what he is used to. AU.
1. Chapter 1

_**You can have anything in life if you will sacrifice everything else for it. - Peter Pan, J.M. Barrie**_

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The town burst into existence in the lonely, quiet forest.

The foliage was remarkably undisturbed, and the ones that had grown where the town now was simply moved over to join their siblings. It was a bit cramped for the forest, but it made room. Once the forest was settled, it stayed and the brief bout of magic settled over its leaves, keeping it still for the next twenty eight years.

Inside, the citizens of Storybrooke awakened.

* * *

Rumpelstiltskin looked outside the window, where the clock tower loomed over the little town. It looked old and grand, and it certainly made a pretty relic for this small place. Of course, it wasn't perfect. The hands were stuck, after all. And they would stay stuck for the next twenty-eight years.

A twenty-eight year break from everything. How relaxing. It should grow dull after a while, but when he surrendered himself to the curse - and a splendid piece of magic that was, if he did say so himself - he wouldn't notice the passing of time. The Queen would be the only one driven insane by the monotonous life.

There were also other benefits to this magic-less world, he supposed.

He peered at his reflection in the glass, and allowed himself to preen a little. His skin was smooth - a few wrinkles here and there, but no scales for the first time in centuries. Rumpelstiltskin giggled to himself.

A world without magic, he mused again, every little bit of it gone except the curse holding them all in place. And then, that too would be gone and he'd search every corner of this new world for his boy. _Who could already be dead, and if he isn't, he certainly doesn't want to see you._

He squashed the thought down.

Rumpelstiltskin's eyes roved over his shop - and yes, he owned a pawnshop now, and it was _filled_ with all these mementos, wasn't that lovely?

The new-world's memories were pricking at his brain, but he held them back for the moment. He didn't want the lines of reality and curse-fiction to blur just yet. There was still so much left to do, and he could examine the people without them knowing him, being wary of him, and wouldn't it be amusing to add to his collection at this shop? He'd let the memories overcome him before Queenie came, because she'd know if he slipped up and forgot something from the new memories, and it really wouldn't do to have her hounding him for the next three decades.

The door slammed open.

"The sign says closed - " Rumpelstiltskin began automatically, before his brain caught up with his eyes.

The boy's hair was tousled from the autumn wind, and his cheeks and nose were flushed red. He was wearing a heavy green coat that swallowed his figure, and brightly-colored rubber boots which must have been something of the norm in this world. The eyes that blinked bits of droplets of water out of them were forest-green and horribly familiar, even if he hadn't seen them in centuries.

"Sorry I'm late," Peter Pan said breathlessly.

* * *

 _The eternal child sat in a crouch, eyes fixated on the dark cloud in the distance._

 _He'd meant to leave. A short jaunt through the Enchanted Forest, play his pipes, observe the boys who came, go back to Neverland. It had been a simple plan, one he'd carried out dozens of times over the centuries._

 _Then he'd sensed it. Something rippling through the air, and headed his way fast. Before long, the something manifested in black thunderclouds that creeped in through the air and ate everything in its path._

 _Magic, he'd thought with the reverence of one who'd lived off of the thing for nearly three hundred years._

 _He'd briefly entertaining the idea of fleeing, but he recognized that brand of black magic - and if Rumple wanted to get his attention in such a dramatic way, who was he to say no?_

 _His lips curled into a smile. The lad was no doubt trying to intimidate him with the Dark One's power -_ the Dark One's power, _and no matter what else he felt about Rumple, pride was certainly there - while his own magic was mainly tied to Neverland._

 _But he knew his boy, Dark One or not, knew exactly how to play him like a fiddle and pick at the insecurities and wounds left untended for - how long had it been? Two, three centuries? He'd win in the end, and the boy would be left picking at another scab in his fraying mind. Honestly, the boy was so_ sentimental _. But that kind of sentiment was something he could rely on. That kind of sentiment meant that Rumple didn't have it in him to kill family._

 _And if he were being a bit more honest with himself, he did also want to see the lad - missed him a little, in his own way._

 _Pan looked at the distance with something like excitement, feeling dark magic thunder through the lands and thrum in his veins.  
_

 _The discrepancy struck him._

 _The_ lands. _The_ entire realm _was being affected, he could feel it. People from peasants and royalty disappearing, vanishing from not only their houses but their world, disappearing from the Enchanted Forest._

 _Maybe, the thought crept into Pan's head and grew as quickly as the spell spreading across the lands, Rumple hadn't really known he was there. Maybe this was something else, something not directed at him._

 _Rumplestiltskin would hesitate before killing_ him. _But perhaps not for killing everyone else, perhaps not the entire Enchanted Forest. Pan had rarely cared for anyone but himself, nor for anyone his decisions influenced, and it was likely his son had inherited that trait.  
_

 _He turned and ran._

 _The spell - a curse type, how had he missed that? - was closing in, snapping at his heels. He'd waited too long. He couldn't outrun it, but perhaps his shadow -  
_

 _The magic snagged him, suffocated him, and dragged him down into what ever his son had unleashed._

 _His shadow flickered into existence, but it was too slow._

 _The curse ate at him and Peter Pan disappeared._

* * *

 **So that's the first chapter. RnR Please! Thoughts, comments, suggestions?  
**


	2. Chapter 2

**Special thanks to YamiMana and Jaguargirl02 for your lovely reviews!**

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The kid lounges behind the counter, leaning on his elbows and piercing her with a stare that is familiar and strange at the same time.

"Who is this?" Regina asks, addressing the question to the Imp, who busies himself with a cabinet in the far corner of the room, but it is not him who speaks up.

"I'm Malcolm," he says, "Pleased to meet you - the Mayor, isn't it?" He smiles, but there is something - a hint of madness with that same familiar unfamiliarity.

His star-bright eyes are unnerving, so Regina turns to the Imp whose danger she is at least aware of. "Your...son?"

"My ward," he replies sharply, and glances back at her.

"I've never seen him before," Regina says, her mind racing. Not in this world or the Enchanted Forest, and this is troubling since she has specifically chosen each inhabitant, knows their stories, strengths and weaknesses.

"Is that so," the Imp says flatly, after a long pause. "Well, you've never been very observant have you, Madam Mayor." He is angry, she realizes - she is still adjusting to the new personalities of the townspeople, and the-Gold's more stoic disposition, the lack of giggling every other sentence, is still something that jars her from time to time. She is learning, though, to recognize his moods again.

"I haven't been here for very long," the kid - Malcolm - pipes up. He explains how his guardians are recently dead, how Gold is his remaining relative and the only one who can take him in. Regina looks at him, but pays little attention to his sob story. In a town built by magic and falseness, whatever he _thinks_ he remembers is bound to have no meaning.

"I see," she says, and scrutinizes the boy. She knows she has never met him, but there is _something -_

"Why have you come here, Mayor?" Gold makes his way over to her, tone brusque and cutting. He avoids looking at the teenager, she notices, although the kid tracks his movements with sharp green eyes.

Upon remembering the issue, Regina explodes. "You know what I'm here for! The - " she cuts herself off when she notices the kid leaning forward, a familiar-unfamilar smile playing at his lips. Her voice drops into a harsh whisper. "This is _not_ what I wanted."

"I'm afraid I don't know what you - " Gold pauses. "Don't you have homework?" he raises his voice to address the kid, but doesn't look away from her.

Malcolm's eyes narrow as he stares at the back of the pawnbroker's head, but after a moment, he huffs and disappears into the back room.

Gold relaxes when the kid leaves, and Regina's wariness slams back full force.

"As I was saying," he's more confident now, and she can hear Rumplestiltskin's mocking tone. "I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about."

* * *

Rumpelstiltskin sits down heavily the moment Regina leaves, his leg suddenly throbbing in a way it hasn't in centuries.

He closes his eyes and lets Mr. Gold seep away.

"Are - you alright?" There is the barest pause between the words; the boy doesn't know how to address Rumpelstiltskin anymore than Rumpelstiltskin knows how to address the boy. _Pan_ doesn't remember - after five days of continuous obsessing, Rumpelstiltskin is sure of at least this - but he _senses_ the wrongness.

Rumpelstiltskin can see, in his mind's eye, the boy floundering beside him in concern and hesitation. He has gotten acquainted with the boy's habits, and they are nothing like his father's. It is somehow worse.

A ward - someone to help out with the shop. A distant relative introduced little more than half a year ago, who is still stiff and awkward around him, not quite sure what to do. This will always be the state of things; tomorrow or twenty years from now, the boy will always have known him for half a year. The curse he created has locked time in place to repeat every detail, ad infinitum.

He muses bitterly that he should be grateful for small mercies that the curse hadn't made Pan his _son._ And it is the curse, accommodating an unforeseen entity, he knows for certain now after Regina has stormed in and practically admitted that she had nothing to do with Pan. Subtlety has never been one of the Queen's strengths.

"I'm fine," he says finally, and the annoyance in his voice is not forced. "It's closing time." _Go home_ is on the tip of his tongue, but it sounds too much like an order from an exasperated father to a son - or at least like an order from _his_ father to him, long ago. He says nothing more. It doesn't matter - the boy understands him anyway, understands most things about him that _Malcolm Gold_ has no right to understand.

It is a moment before he can hear the boy moving away and a rustling of papers as they are stuffed hazardously into a backpack. Then footsteps, moving towards the door. They stop.

"Aren't you coming?"

"I'll catch up," he says, and the boy sighs.

"You do that."

They both know he won't - he'll sleep in the back of his shop, as he has for the entire week of the curse. This clashes with what Rumpelstiltskin knows Malcolm Gold remembers. According to the boy, they have lived under the same roof for months. In truth, Rumplestiltskin hasn't set foot in his new house.

The door shuts. Rumpelstiltskin is still for another five minutes before he opens his eyes and moves slowly around the counter.

He picks up the scarf first, and submerges himself in memories of Baelfire. It hurts, remembering his son's screams and the betrayal in those dark eyes, but it is better than the alternative. He puts down the scarf and moves on to the next item. He holds each item with reverence, remembering its history and his involvement in it, in its past owner's stories until he can almost see the Enchanted Forest and hear trolls roaring in the distance.

The last item is the chipped cup, and by the time he is finished remembering Belle's sweet voice and the pain of her dying, he is assured that he is the Dark One and not a pawnshop owner.

He puts down the cup with shuddering sigh, feeling the life of Mr. Gold shoving at the edges of his mind. They are delayed, for now - remembering the old life helps, but he senses that it won't for long. The curse is strong, and he never _thought_ of putting any precautions to retain his memories. It was pointless and, until he could search for Bae, torturous.

But now. Now he has to be on his guard - Pan is destructive and terrible, and if the eternal child even _thinks_ of jeopardizing his chances of finding Bae -

He _must_ remember, so he that is prepared the moment that _Malcolm Gold_ shifts into _Peter Pan._

(He has thought of eliminating the threat. But, he reasons, that isn't how the curse works - it keeps everything in tandem, unchanging, and lets no one leave past the town line and likely won't take kindly to anyone leaving through the benefits of mortality. Taking Pan out could cause the curse to react unpredictably, and he can't have that, not when he's done so much to get to this point.

He rationalizes and rationalizes, and tries to ignore the small voice that says he will never be able to bring himself to do it, anyway.)

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 **RnR!**


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